Cities and Memory: review of the year 2018
It’s been a huge year for Cities and Memory, with four sound projects launched, our new series of city guides, the total number of countries on the sound map now up to an amazing 85 and even a trip to Russia! Here’s a rundown of our 2018:
Sounds in the project
Countries on the sound map
Total sound plays
Contributing artists
2018 project: Sound Photography
Our Sound Photography project was the biggest ever worldwide artistic interaction between photographers and sound artists, covering 34 countries and six continents with sound pieces inspired by photographs.
The project was covered by The Verge, as well as a number of specialist photography sites.
2018 project: Sounding Nature
November’s Sounding Nature project was the biggest ever global exploration of the sounds of nature and our environment, covering 55 countries with almost 500 sounds. The sounds were all reimagined by 250 artists to reflect upon the damage being done to our natural world by human-generated sounds.
The project got widespread media coverage, including the BBC’s Today programme, BBC World Service, The Verge, IFL Science and even our first television interview!
Cities and Memory in Moscow
We were honoured to be asked to speak at this year’s Moscow Urban Forum over the summer, speaking on a panel about the preservation of memory in cities, and the role sound has to play in urban spaces.
You can watch the session in full here.
Metaphonics book launch
We contributed an essay entitled “The noise made by people: anthrophony, cities and memory” to an incredible box set of music and field recordings by Stuart Hyatt, released on one of our favourite record labels Temporary Residence.
Find out more about the collection here.
City sound guides
This year saw the launch of the first batch of our city sound guides – guides to the essential sounds to listen out for when visiting particular cities.
From Venice to Yangon, we covered ten cities in the first wave, with more to come during 2019. 
Here’s the rundown so far:
Review of the year: field recordings and sound tools
Sounds of the year 2018: download the free album
Country-specific projects
This year, we also ran two smaller projects focusing on reimagining the sounds from particular countries, focusing on collections of sounds (mostly) by Cities and Memory from Italy, and contributed by Stephane Marin from Sri Lanka.
You can download album release of the highlights from these two projects below.
Sounds from Italy
Sounds from Sri Lanka
A huge and heartfelt THANK YOU to everyone who has contributed a sound or a recomposed piece to the project in 2018 – Cities and Memory could not exist without you. Find out more about our incredible contributors over here.
A very happy and productive 2019 to everyone!
